Echo the above. Some great and some bad teachers. But my 8th grader has grown to hate Deal bc of the crowds, fights, and chaos. It was tolerable at first, but she has grown really tired of feeling like she enters a war zone every day at school. She is dreading J-R for this reason.

Anonymous wrote:In my experience the "bad" is that the teachers can be very uneven. This is mostly a product of the school being so large and the inability to hire (and fire) quickly in DCPS.

I sent 3 kids through Deal and we had some absolutely fantastic teachers and some that were horrendous. My one kid (over the course of his 3 years) had two teachers quit on the spot and each time it took 3+ months to find and hire a replacement and in the meantime this kid didn't have instruction in a core subject.

This is a large part of why people have polarizing opinions on Deal. If you have all good teachers, it's fantastic. If you have a horrible one or have one quit, it's an entirely different experience.

For the most part, complaints about Deal are absurdly overblown. It's a massive public middle school, and most public schools that size are going to have the same issues (go over to the MoCo boards, which deal with schools that allegedly are far superior, and you'll see people complaining about the same types of things). But there's a kernel of truth to the teacher thing, and that the teacher issue cannot be fixed easily by Deal itself. My kid, now an eighth-grader, has had some good teachers but also two science teachers either quit days before school started (literally 2-3 days before) or go on leave for hazily defined reasons. And now her current science teacher, who already seemed quite checked-out, is going on medical leave for two months and perhaps longer.

In my experience the "bad" is that the teachers can be very uneven. This is mostly a product of the school being so large and the inability to hire (and fire) quickly in DCPS.

I sent 3 kids through Deal and we had some absolutely fantastic teachers and some that were horrendous. My one kid (over the course of his 3 years) had two teachers quit on the spot and each time it took 3+ months to find and hire a replacement and in the meantime this kid didn't have instruction in a core subject.

This is a large part of why people have polarizing opinions on Deal. If you have all good teachers, it's fantastic. If you have a horrible one or have one quit, it's an entirely different experience.

We’ve been pleasantly surprised with Deal and holding our breaths waiting to see the “bad”.

For those interested in attending Deal, I thought the first open house went well. The student presenter was most impressive, followed by the 6th grade assistant principal and other members of the 6th team.

I understand that Deal is a huge school. But other than that, I'm seriously wondering why Deal has such a reputation for being "bad" as a middle school option. I'm looking forward to the in person open house on 12/7.